Almost exactly 1 year later, after crashing and burning from overplay last year, I picked up and beat it.

Honestly? Maybe I needed it to sit with me for a while and let it ruminate, but I came back loving it more than I started out for some reason. The battle system is a TON of fun (despite each attack being brighter than the 4th of July), the skills/titles system is clever and very different. But what I love the most is the sheer amount of added affects to the titles and the "square-scroll" features (and how you can manipulate it: like with Piggybacking, making the "next attack be added to your own" can help you kill Rocknagong in one hit).I love how in-depth it all is, and I love when Tales games do more with less characters. Each character is very versatile and great for different situations.

The dungeons are terrible and the world is basic, and there is generally NOTHING to love about your visit to Zehvert/Fendel (it's dark, depressing, and dreary), but the light-hearted cast brightens it up a bit, and the addition of discoveries make things a bit interesting in that Skies of Arcadia way. I also love the amount of extras, and I was really happy with Zhonecage's version of an off-beat bonus dungeon. Overall, a keeper.

The new Grade system was brutal. Not dying ONCE is an almost impossible condition, and half of the points can be rewarded with spending time with the game -- which counters the points you can get for beating the game in less time (which, me thinks, just isn't worth it). Some of the INN requests suck serious ass too (Medicine at Warrior's Roost...that's just head-in-ass annoying). I had a chuckle that you can pay 10 points to skip the childhood arc. Even the dev's know that it went hours longer than it needed or players would probably want.

EDIT: Anyone else read "Amarcian" as "American"??? I did...and I never learned.

Anyways

Kyuu: everone says that, I might have to watch an LP. I'm glad Cortana looks a little less plastic-y.

I went back and played some Graces F too since the computer was down. Even though I didn't remember much about the fighting system I was able to finish Zhonecage on hard. I guess I had crafted some pretty good gear to support my fail.

I need to go around and learn every title then make a new game+ with everything kept and be a god!

Funny you mention that, I'm right before that scene (playing it the other day). Not going to lie, Infinite Undiscovery is one of my favorite games. After two years of inactive playing, I picked it up last week and went through it...and for some reason doing a heck of a lot better now than I did back then. I nailed the dragon run when your carrying Aya to a village in one shot, which I used to have so much trouble with that before.

Went through a bit more of Nier, and darn is this a beautiful game too look and listen to.

Funny you mention that, I'm right before that scene (playing it the other day). Not going to lie, Infinite Undiscovery is one of my favorite games. After two years of inactive playing, I picked it up last week and went through it...and for some reason doing a heck of a lot better now than I did back then. I nailed the dragon run when your carrying Aya to a village in one shot, which I used to have so much trouble with that before.

Went through a bit more of Nier, and darn is this a beautiful game too look and listen to.

I liked Infinite Undiscovery quite a bit too (and even reviewed it for the site), but I'm a pretty big fan of tri-Ace. SO4 was not the greatest, though. I liked IU alot more.

I don't think I can trust anyone in Vesperia. Pretty much every single character except for Repede has either performed a surprising turn, acted in a surprising manner, or has had backstory revealed as such to add a layer to the character. Every time I say "that character will totally die or turn evil" it happens, but maybe not in the way I expected. And then someone I *didn't* expect to die or turn evil did so. Also: combat is fun, and I have zero problems grinding for materials, skills, and Altered Artes.

Funny you mention that, I'm right before that scene (playing it the other day). Not going to lie, Infinite Undiscovery is one of my favorite games. After two years of inactive playing, I picked it up last week and went through it...and for some reason doing a heck of a lot better now than I did back then. I nailed the dragon run when your carrying Aya to a village in one shot, which I used to have so much trouble with that before.

Went through a bit more of Nier, and darn is this a beautiful game too look and listen to.

I liked Infinite Undiscovery quite a bit too (and even reviewed it for the site), but I'm a pretty big fan of tri-Ace. SO4 was not the greatest, though. I liked IU alot more.

I thought the only good thing about IU was that under certain conditions you could get your own party members to flip out and attack you?

Anyways, I've completed the first DLC Challenge map in Awakening. If there was ever a reason to invest in getting as many people to acquire Galeforce as you can, this is it. The stage is literally built around aggressively gibing 1HP dudes so that they can't saunter up to you and smack you with a nearly maxed out Vengeance hit for a fuck ton of unmitigated damage (even having a solid healer throw out a Fortify heal isn't enough to compensate for a Vengeance proc and Sol/Nosferatu doesn't help that much when there's nothing left to drain). Galeforce also helps in bumrushing the stage's boss Algol for the Est card although you do need to watch out for the Risen chief when gunning for the boss since the fucker is nasty (forged Brave Lance with maxed/nearly maxed stats plus Lancefaire, Vengeance, Counter, Luna, and Axebreaker).

I think I'm getting close to starting a Lunatic Classic run for shits and giggles now that most of the DLC is out (I'm not going to use the DLC as a crutch so much as I'm going to focus on a no grinding playthough, allowing the occasional DLC as a supplement (and I wont even touch the grinding ones), or I could even make a DLC character only run since I won't have support bonuses to aid me).

Honestly Mass Effect went from too much RPG in 1 (or at least, a VERY cumbersome inventory system) to not enough in 2. ME3 strikes a balance, but I'd still have liked a biiit more in the way of ME1. Minus having to sell fifty Avengers every time I left a planet, of course.

I actually liked the planet scanning in 2, but I missed the Mako at the same time. The Hammerhead kind of blows in comparison. :P

Let's see. I started Dishonored last night - only played like an hour before I fell asleep, but it's interesting. Let;s see if I can actually pull of stealth! Also picked up Soul Hackers today, I was getting worried about my demons dying off in the first bunch of battles before I realized... well, it didn't matter. ;)

The thing I liked least about ME2 and 3 was flying the ship around the galaxy. It went from feeling like I was plotting jump points on my nav computer to playing asteroids or Star Control without combat. Took away the feeling of the expansive sense of space

The thing I liked least about ME2 and 3 was flying the ship around the galaxy. It went from feeling like I was plotting jump points on my nav computer to playing asteroids or Star Control without combat. Took away the feeling of the expansive sense of space

I agree. Being ringed didn't really give the sense of being part of a vast galaxy. And I'll be honest, I hated the fuel system. It just felt like a waste of time, and served no real purpose outside of giving you something to spend your credits on.

I agree. Being ringed didn't really give the sense of being part of a vast galaxy. And I'll be honest, I hated the fuel system. It just felt like a waste of time, and served no real purpose outside of giving you something to spend your credits on.

I agree with you and Yoda. When I'm playing a space opera, the last thing I want is to make the *space* part of it a chore!

I finished TitS, I haven't played many JRPGs in recent years and this was just the ticket. The only thing I didn't like about it was that until the last few hours, the combat was a complete cakewalk. Still, it was nice to play an RPG with fixed encounters where you don't feel obligated to fight every monster - I avoided most of the normal enemies and still got more than enough experience fighting bosses.

Welp. Finished the second challenge DLC map in Awakening in two tries.

First try went fairly well up until the reinforcements started pouring out of the woodwork. Then suddenly I've got like 20 fliers sporting capped strength/speed bum rushing the five Annas and my four fliers are either indisposed or ended the last turn in a support position and the rest can't even reach the islands where all the enemies are pouring out from, and that's not even mentioning the Mire assholes or the fact that everybody's got Swordbreaker and a couple have Spearbreaker just to be assholes to my predominately spear wielding fliers or that because I'm playing on Hard mode all these fliers spawn in then immediately cover half the ground between them and they're entirely focused with destroying the Annas and ignoring your guys and the Annas and you can't move the Annas at all and the Annas have shitty stats (well okay, they've all capped their non luck/HP stats but they have nothing but unmodified Villager caps of 20 which is useless against enemies sporting 60+ Might and 35~40 Attack Speed) and Rescue is useless (more for unscrewing a bad placement last turn than to do anything with the Annas) and....Goddammit Chrom! What the hell happened to you? You used to be so solid and now you're getting doubled and wrecked by fucking Falcon Knights.

Second try ended before the reinforcements even got a chance to show up. I didn't even get a chance to break out any of my newly forged toys or anything. :(